


The Art of Scraping Through

by AvrielleRogue



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Adultery, Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Cheating, F/M, just fuck me up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2018-10-24
Packaged: 2019-08-06 20:08:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16394264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvrielleRogue/pseuds/AvrielleRogue
Summary: W.R.T. the title, I thought Hozier's "Someone New" was a cheery, upbeat song, until I listened to the lyrics. Then it was a gloomy upbeat song.





	The Art of Scraping Through

Anora knew just how to feel.

That crisp autumn day when the War Table meeting ended unusually early. When a stilled fist held before her bedroom door gave way to a throaty gasp and ruffling of sheets within. When an Antivan princess had leapt out of her marriage bed and run into the hallway with only a sheet to cover her, like only happened in bad romance literature.

Anora knew just how to feel because she’d _known_ kings acted this way. She’d been warned. Tomes on the price and weight of royalty, lessons about political marriages where love was an unexpected perk, harsh-but-ultimately-wise advisors over-explaining the needs of _men_ \-- everything she’d grown up studying had taught her to react with grace and poise in situations like this.

Still, that pigtailed girlish naivety that skipped along all the way into adulthood had her convinced that it hadn’t been possible. Not from her Cailan. “ _Her_ ” Cailan.

Cailan, who sat next to her in their private box at theatre performances depicting tales of roguish men, rolling his eyes the entire carriage ride home, rattling off what cards those men were, what rakes.

Cailan, who couldn’t lie to Howe about the number of homeless elves in Denerim’s Alienage, when he knew inflating the number just a little might have gotten them a bit more monetary aid. Whom she’d kissed on the nose as they retired to bed that night, ribbing him with a whisper of how safe their marriage was in the face of his inability to lie.

Cailan, who’d touched Anora’s chin just that morning over coffee, lifting her gaze to his to capture her lips in a kiss, knowing -- _knowing_ \-- what he intended to do that night with the princess in town.

Because he’d done it before, of course. Because the last time the princess visited -- Anora pieced together later -- there had been a laundering mix-up, and her servants had inserted a frilly pair of smallclothes she didn’t recognize into her wardrobe that only now made perfect chest-crushing sense.

He didn’t beg. He carded a hand through his sandy blond hair on their bed, sheepish, sweating, and spent. He didn’t grovel. He simply apologized. He said he still loved her, that this wouldn’t change anything if she still wished to have him. An honor he didn’t deserve, but would spend the rest of his life making up to her.

Leave it to Cailan to be persuasive and powerful in apology, something he could never seem to be in front of advisors or nobles.

Anora sent him from their room and spent one week sleeping alone -- just the one week.

She was hardly going to annul their marriage. Not after her father had given so much to ensure her succession. Not after a lifetime of being groomed for leadership. Not after preparing for situations like this that “always happened with men in positions of power and too much free time on their hands.”

Her nights were haunted with imagined vignettes. How he must have looked forward so to a visitation from this princess. But why wait for a royal expedition? His indiscretions likely included Anora’s own handmaids, the younger teyrnas, wayward Chantry sisters visiting with holy advice and kneeling in supplication in all hours of the night. Right?

How he must have looked forward to Anora’s long War Table meetings, to have a moment alone with the woman of the evening. Perhaps they laughed together about Anora’s ignorance as they made love right under her nose, right between her bedsheets.

When a thought occurred to her about the timing of their most recent intercourse and how long the princess had been in town, Anora ran to the royal healer, horrified that Cailan might have introduced to her some disease. She wouldn’t divulge the true reason for her visit, so the healer clucked his tongue, dismissing her fears as nonsense, and suggesting it were only possible with an act of her own infidelity.

Cailan returned to their marital chambers after the week was out, eyes cast down, head hanging low. He’d slept in the soldiers’ barracks, and it seemed his time alone had humbled him, shamed him. The next months were spent groveling.

An unexpected bouquet of Andraste’s Grace adorned her breakfast table each morning. An exotic bracelet arrived soon, adorned with beads from every corner of Thedas -- _missing_ the bead for Antiva, she’d noticed. A nice touch.

When she’d warmed enough to allow it, Cailan fell over himself to woo Anora once again. Whenever they were apart, his return was spent recounting what had transpired before apologizing for any understandable concern -- a habit not requested by Anora, but comforting just the same.

Once, after a particularly good stint of days, Cailan had rounded a corner to find Anora sniffling quietly outside their bedroom, the door closed by a foolish servant. He’d whispered a question of permission to touch her, and at her nod, scooped her up into his strong arms, leading her to their bed, wiping away her tears.

Cailan was trying, which he didn’t have to do. The king could have anyone he _wanted_ as his bride. Maybe an alliance with Antiva would even have been a wise one.

He didn’t have to stay, and yet he did. Her Cailan. For better, for worse.

At night, when they could finally speak of it more freely, as they laid side-by-side bathed in the moonlight spilling in from their tall tower window, Anora often asked Cailan why. He could offer nothing but a timid, “I don’t know.”

But he’d gotten it out of his system, he promised her. It took too much out of him to keep up the lie. It had been making him sick, one indiscretion after the other, promising himself he’d stop and failing out of weakness so many times. How he hated failure so, and the shame drove him to act out. But now that she knew everything, he was free. Cailan would work tirelessly to make her fall in love with him all over again, if she’d let him.

After half a year, they even resumed their lovemaking. Anora had ordered Cailan to the _new_ royal healer for a confirmation of a clean bill of health, and he’d obediently gone, returning with a weak smile and a bouquet of Rivaini flowers that must have cost a fortune to transport at this time of year.

Still, that first time had been difficult. For all her healing, and for all the… womanly needs that itched to be met, in the midst of it, Anora still had to forcibly tamp down intrusive thoughts as he pumped away above her. The two of them had been making love since they were teenagers. What a fool she’d been not to have questioned this new move that had wormed its way into his repertoire only a scant year ago.

Cailan had noticed, and, Maker bless him, stopped, brushing a lock of hair behind her small ear and cradling her face in his hand. She allowed him to curl against her protectively as she fell asleep in a tight ball.

Soon, the intrusive thoughts became fewer and fewer. Anora welcomed their newly revitalized couplings after long nights arguing politics with stuffy nobles. It relaxed her. He never stopped trying. The bouquets of Andraste’s Grace continued to adorn her breakfast table.

:::

The night before the Battle of Ostagar, in royal officers’ tents positioned far away from the ruins, Anora excused herself from late-night plotting. Her handmaid Erlina tucked a knife into her boot, and the two hopped one of her father’s horses to the front lines to wish Cailan luck.

It was after midnight when they arrived. Only a few lanterns lit the tents of last-minute strategizing officers -- her father’s being one of them. The mages and Ash Warriors had all gone to sleep. Even the Wardens’ tents were silent.

Cailan’s tent still had a light within, and when she approached, her heart dropped into her stomach just as it had nearly a year ago.

A soft moan. Whispered promises she’d thought -- foolishly a second time -- were only meant for her ears, spoken by her husband to another woman. The new Grey Warden, who, as Loghain had described her, had more beauty than sense.

Anora took a step backwards and almost fell into Erlina’s arms. The whole ride back, Anora cursed her bitter tears. What a fool to allow herself to believe Cailan’s indiscretions had been a flaw of his youth. It wasn’t out of his system. It was a pathological character flaw -- one the world was forcing her to live with. The rest of her life was a prison, or she could denounce her role as leader of Ferelden. Simple as that.

If only the children who curtsied as she passed on the streets knew the life they were envying. She’d been just as idealistic. As a child, when she’d hugged her skinned knees against her chest dreaming of the day she would be queen, she never could have imagined this would be her happily ever after. Would she have told that girl to seek another path?

When word reached Anora the next evening that the Wardens had abandoned the field of battle, that her king was lost, for the first time in as long as she could remember, Anora didn’t know how to feel.

**Author's Note:**

> W.R.T. the title, I thought Hozier's "[Someone New](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPJSsAr2iu0)" was a cheery, upbeat song, until I listened to the lyrics. Then it was a gloomy upbeat song.


End file.
